Category: On Writing
From Blank Page to Mr. Knoll
By Nanette L. Avery If writing What Killed Mr. Knoll changed anything in me, it wasn’t dramatic. It clarified something. We’re quick to describe communities as attentive and supportive, but those claims don’t always hold up under pressure. This book doesn’t accuse; it observes, looking at what slips through the cracks and what that reveals […]
Character Interview for Love Is All by Donna Hewlett
By Donna Hewlett A Conversation with Jayne and Mason Some stories begin with a setting. Others begin with a question. Love Is All began with both. I have long believed that places shape us. Stand in a European square at dusk, beneath stone that has witnessed centuries of longing and loss, and perspective shifts. If […]
You don’t Find Home. Home Finds You
By Roz Morris I’d lived in my London house for thirty years. Originally I arrived there bewildered and reckless, moving in with a man I’d known for one week, and the house kept asking: Are you sure? Do you belong here? Decades later, we were still happily there. The house was the keeper of our […]
Authors Interviewing Characters: Danielle Girard
PINKY SWEAR From Danielle Girard, the USA TODAY bestselling author who “effortlessly ratchets up the tension” (J.T. Ellison, New York Times bestselling author), comes a pulse-pounding thriller about a young woman whose surrogate disappears just days before the baby’s due date, leading to a frantic search that uncovers dark truths and the power of a mother’s love. Lexi thought […]
Finding Both Inspiration and Motivation
By Sandra K. Griffith I’m consistently asked three questions about my novel, One Beautiful Year of Normal, the first of which is some version of the basic “what’s your novel about?” If I take a really deep breath I can usually answer that question in one sentence….It’s a story about a woman whose life was drastically […]
Researching THE OTHER MOCTEZUMA GIRLS
By Sofia Robleda This novel was born, raised, and fed on research. The mere idea of it started circa 2019 or 2020, as I conducted my investigation for my debut novel Daughter of Fire. It was then that I came across the story of Tecuichpoch, the last empress of the Mexica (pronounced Meh-shee-ka, more commonly […]
On Writing Alive And Beating
Rebecca Wolf My debut novel, “Alive and Beating,” follows six people from diverse backgrounds and neighborhoods in Jerusalem, all of whom are awaiting organ transplants, on the day that will forever change their lives. “Alive and Beating” is modeled on two books that deeply influenced me: “Hiroshima” by John Hersey, and “The Bridge of San […]
Who Were You B.C. (before children)?
By Beth Farrar An interesting part of memoir writing is going back in time and remembering who you were before life hit you. Before you became a mother or father, and suddenly your given name was not often heard in your household. “Mom, where’s my shoes?” “Dad, can you drive me to the rink?” B.C., […]
On Writing THE DEFLECTOR
Nicole Liang Having lived in four countries across three continents, my writing has been shaped by the crossroads of multiple cultures in more ways than I’ve realized. I grew up in Singapore, attended college in the United States, worked in finance in Hong Kong, and completed my MBA in the United Kingdom. Today, I write […]
The Full Catastrophe, One Year Later: Unexpected Gifts
By Casey Mulligan Walsh When I began writing personal essays fifteen years ago, one of things I valued most was forming close connections with other writers. Having lived a life filled with an unusual amount of loss and trauma, topics we still don’t discuss openly in our culture, learning that my earliest readers—primarily critique partners—were […]
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